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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26649661">The Scent of You</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thyra279/pseuds/Thyra279'>Thyra279</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>BT Tower Telephone Group H [10]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman &amp; Terry Pratchett</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Experimental, Fluff, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Ineffable Partners, It's a fic :D, Multi, erh went a bit off the rails, not really... yeah. uh. well, soft, there's a lot about smells in here</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 09:55:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>919</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26649661</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thyra279/pseuds/Thyra279</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Somewhere along the way, the smell of the Earth came to remind him of Crowley...</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>BT Tower Telephone Group H [10]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1937899</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>38</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Scent of You</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">


        <li>
            Inspired by

            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26663161">In the garden</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/caricari/pseuds/caricari">caricari</a>.
        </li>

    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>It starts, as it will end, with a garden.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There are no trees in Hell. No flowers in Heaven.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They've always met in gardens, the two of them. Whenever they could. Or perhaps Aziraphale simply remembers it that way. In gardens and parks and forests, places full of life and vitality, full of the reminder, always, that Earth will prevail.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It started with </span>
  <em>
    <span>the </span>
  </em>
  <span>garden, of course, only somewhere along the way, the smell of grass and flowers, of nature herself came to remind him of Crowley. Gradually, the musky, ancient smell of soil, the heady scent of Earth itself came to be tied up inextricably with his demon.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It snuck up on him, the association taking root millennia ago already, in little dry whiffs of bark, in wafts of humid, verdant greens across the world. Just a toothy smile at first, disguised as a sneer, at the gentle scent of jasmine in a courtyard in Jordan. A series of his incomprehensible syllables ringing out in the middle of the musky Amazonian undergrowth.  The casual, elegant flick of his slender wrist flipping a coin, suddenly springing to mind under the heavy, heady shade of an orange tree in Spain. It came upon him like a frog in boiling water, bit by bit, took hold of him so gradually, so seductively slowly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The realisation, however, came suddenly, took him by surprise in beachside forest by the Baltic two centuries ago.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He remembers it so clearly still. There'd been just the faintest, sweetest trill of honeysuckle in the air as he stared out at the Baltic and before he knew it, there she was, a mess of gangly limbs and elegant black robes, red hair cascading down her back as she made her way towards him in a cloud of dust in Jerusalem. Then the wind had shifted, bringing the earthy, sour smell of pine and Aziraphale was back in England, back in torturously weighty armour staring at his curious yellow eyes, at the sharp, thin bridge of his nose as they failed to come to an agreement about anything other than the very damp conditions of their work. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Ah</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he'd thought. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Oh dear</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He'd paid attention after that, had sought out Crowley wherever he might lurk, had gone along willingly whenever a rose or a rosemary bush or a rotting old tree stump had slithered up his nostrils, breathed in deeply, gratefully, to be closer to his demon, squeezed his eyes shut against everything else.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There are only bad smells in Hell, as he'd recently discovered, plenty of those, and yet Crowley smelt lovely, always had.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There are no smells in Heaven at all, good or bad.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is nearly overwhelming, here, on summer evenings just when night falls. The grass, the roses, the insistent aroma of another honeysuckle at the back of their garden, the delicate breeze from the little apple trees he's insisted on despite Crowley's protestations. The heady earthiness of the beautiful meadow that had been entirely Crowley's doing. It is almost too much, together skin-to-skin under the blanket in their own little piece of Paradise, all these smells and scents and perfumes colliding in the garden all around them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He brings Crowley flowers from the meadow every day now, because he can. Kisses her flushed skin here, just now, right this moment, because he can. Brushes his lips across the soft, tickly hair under her arm because he can, and he's allowed to, and Crowley wants him to, and isn't that wonderful. Chuckles softly right there, onto the warm, damp place under her arm because he can't, he can't help himself, can't help himself from laughing at his sudden realisation, can't stop himself feeling just a little stupid, can't stop himself delighting in the little squirm the demon lets out under him when his laugh tickles her skin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"What the fuck, Aziraphale?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I'm sorry, my dear, it's just – you smell nothing like any of it, nothing like the flowers or the trees or the soil."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"…Never claimed to, did I?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"No, but in my mind- I don't know how it happened. But you do." He presses a kiss to the soft, forgiving flesh above her heart, feels it pump away beneath his lips despite it all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Oh?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Yes. I'm afraid I can't quite explain it."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley sniffs, pushes Aziraphale’s head further down her, a little insistently. "Got plenty of other things to be getting on with anyway, Angel."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He quite agrees, and continues to kiss her because he can, continues to bring him flowers because he can, and he continues to think of his demon, readily and willingly, every time he catches the lovely smell of a flower or soil or a tree, because he can, and he's allowed to, and he can't help but think of Crowley every time he catches a whiff of this glorious, vigorous, ever-changing Earth, and no other sense can really quite capture Crowley like this, in a moment, bring him back so immediately to an eternity of memories of his demon and even more to come on this wonderful, verdan Earth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But for now, he has plenty of other things to smell and feel and taste and there are plenty of trees, there's an ocean of flowers in a very old, slightly unkempt garden in South Downs. Come morning, they stand just a little taller, are just a little more verdant, just a little more beautiful. Come morning, to the neighbours’ surprise, even the gnarly old pine trees have bloomed.</span>
</p><p>
  
</p>
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